Day 235 of 365

I have the entire week off from work and I'm ready to go. The flu is gone and I need to get myself moving. I need some goals for the week and I've got a good list started.

I have a mixture of household tasks and sewing tasks to be accomplished. This week I will:

• Quilt all my unfinished quilt tops.
• Do a tutorial for Stockings for Soldiers. On how to make the stockings, of course.
• Call to get roofing quotes. Yuck.
• Write up directions for the strip quilt for my school's Project Linus blankets.
• Put the electric blanket on the bed.
• Dust, dust, dust.
• Put new curtains up in the bedroom. Finally.
• Rake leaves. Rake leaves. Rake leaves.
• Take the casino bus for the day. Free food, $50 in free play. Yay!
• Make final payments on all the medical bills that have been dragging on for ages - physical therapy, MRI, and ultrasounds.
• If the hard freeze comes this week as predicted - pull up the pepper plants and pick the remaining pumpkins and watermelon.

One of the items has already been started. I finished up the quilt top I made yesterday. I added a fleece backing and tied it with some excess candlewicking thread I had. Unfortunately, the only matching piece of fleece I had was a bit smaller than it should be, so the quilt isn't perfect. (At least by my standards.) They'll be no picture taking of it, but I'll make another one (need the practice, ya know) with the correct size fleece.

A better picture was found outside today anyway. If that hard freeze shows up, these roses won't look nearly as pretty. But they sure are pretty right now.

Day 234 of 365

Nine. I have a backlog of nine.

These last couple weeks I've been slowly working away on putting together kids quilts for Operation Kid Comfort and Quilts for Kids. Yesterday evening when I still wasn't feeling so hot I went into the sewing room to clean up some scraps. And counted. Counted the quilt tops finished that need to be quilted.

I came up with eight. I don't know how that happened. Usually I might have two or three, but somehow with being busy with work and my daughter being here and me not feeling so great this week, I wound up with quite a pile. I've never had that many at once ready to be quilted. This is the time where I wish I knew someone who liked doing the quilting part.

Yet this afternoon I made another quilt top for yet another charity project.

The school counselor where I work is putting something together for Project Linus. Project Linus is another kids quilt/blanket donation/charity organization. I'll give more details later on the school's specific project, but I was asked to design a quilt easy enough for even non-sewers to make. 

So I did. And that makes nine.

My own version of a simple strip quilt. Straight seams, no need to match corners. Easy and quick. I'm working on putting together yardage requirements and clear and concise directions. (Guess my writing skills will be coming in handy yet again). This one will be backed with fleece, something new for me.

Maybe I'll tackle that learning experience tomorrow. 

Day 233 of 365

My daughter stepped it up again.

She's been home these last couple days, hanging out, helping around the house a bit. She was planning on heading back home yesterday afternoon, but plans changed.

Not long after I wrote here yesterday about how icky I was feeling and how I wasn't up to taking my husband to the eye doctor in the evening, things changed. Not in a good way. As the time got closer and closer to his appointment, things started deteriorating more and more. By the time I needed to leave I had developed a full blown case of the stomach flu. Hours and hours of it.

Being too sick to even think, my daughter stepped up and took over. She picked her dad up, took him out for dinner, got him to his appointment, went grocery shopping, and filled the car with gas. She delivered him back home, unloaded the car, checked on her mamma, then turned around and went back to her place late last night.

I don't know what I would have done without her. It was one of those times when you're so very sick you can't worry about anyone or anything else. All you want to do is be in your jammies and in bed. And last night I only had to worry about myself.

My grown up, 23 year old daughter covered my responsibilities. Again, another proud mom moment. Just wish I was feeling better to enjoy it.

I did sit up for a while today, just long enough to write and to put a pillow form into the pillow I had made for Operation Kid Comfort. This one will be going to a little girl who has a dad away in the Air Force.

Day 232 of 365

I don't get excited about too many things. The thought of having a few days in a row off from work was something I was looking forward to. Except knowing the pattern I've fallen into, it isn't turning out as exciting as I thought it would.

Here's the pattern:

• Go to work and work 10+ hour days.
• Come home to dinner on the table (thanks to hubby). Eat dinner with little energy for conversation.
• Go to the computer and work another hour or two.
• Go to bed exhausted.
• Wake up the next morning still exhausted and do the same thing.

Heading into this going back to work thing, I thought the days off would be like when I wasn't working. Take my time getting up and getting dressed. No stresses, no worries. But now that I'm into it, it appears the stresses and worries (and e-mails to be answered) spill over from my work days into my days-off days. And the exhaustion from overdoing it on the work days carries over into my days-off days. With my days off from work having been sporadic, I've wound up using those days off as recovery days.

There probably is a solution. Don't overdo it at work. Don't work once I get home. Don't answer work e-mails on days off. Easier said than done.

Today is one of those days I'm paying for it. I'm off today, but had to do some work-related tasks. But the rest of the day has been icky. Not feeling well, tired, joints hurting. Knowing I have to take my husband to his yearly eye-doctor appointment tonight is not something I have the energy for, either.

These are the times I realize that I've taken on too much and my health can't sustain it for much longer.

But still a picture for the day. Thank goodness a butterfly happened to land on the window.